The 21st Century American Dream

To be an American in the twenty-first century... Americans now have everything in excess and accessible at the tips of their fingers. We have been a super power since the end of the second world war. All this time at the top is starting to go our heads. We have slowly become more and more accustomed to not working for our spot at the top. Along with an incredible influx of technology and electronics has coupled to form a monster. We are becoming more and more lazy. In a world when an apple costs a dollar and a box of twinkies costs 1.29, we are turning away from the ways of the past or the healthy, the way we got to the top, for convenience. In our laziness we are become faceless as well. There is very little face to face contact anymore. Social networks and texting have taken over as forms of communication. I believe be doing this we are merging even more so as the melting pot of the world. We are all faceless. As we continue to drift apart by not speaking face to face, we drift closer as no discrimination can be performed by faceless words on a page. Everyone is gaining more access to the American Dream. If you don't have these forms of communication you may miss out on this dream, but I believe we are moving closer to world where money, race, gender all cease to make a difference. In this sense no one is held back from reaching "the Dream."

Reader Response: Woman Warrior

I found Woman Warrior to be a quick read. Its story line was jumbled at times and it took me a few pages at times to recognize exactly who was speaking, what was going on, when the story was being told from and who was speaking. The opening chapter about the narrator's aunt was terribly heartbreaking. To know that there is so much discrimination in part of the world regarding gender is stunning. I understand that in a different time adultery was seen as unacceptable and death or exile would be the punishment but to me it seems difficult to read. Throughout the book the insecurity the narrator felt simply due to her gender was frightening. I find it tough to understand the struggle she experiences, because rarely if ever in American society do we see such discrimination. In the world we live in today nothing is out of reach for anyone, regardless of race gender or any other circumstance. This just goes back to the American Dream we defined at the beginning of the class. Even once she moves to America she still feels inadequate compared to other men. Its sad really that a society can brain wash a society into thinking that a huge group of people are less than another. I have heard that due to this brain washing 52% of China's people are male. This seems like a small difference but when you consider the fact that China's population is over a billion this means that there are 20 million more men in China then woman. Meaning that there is vast amount of bachelors in China that will never be able to find a love or a mate.

Reader Response: Beloved

This was the first book we read in class that I absolutely could not get into at all. I found it extremely difficult to read the book. There was very little dialog in the book which made it read very slow. Most of the action that took place in very long, detailed, yet vague paragraphs. None of the book was written in straight out English so much of the action had to be inferred or interpreted and there were so many illusions it was difficult to know what was happening and what was not. I found the history of the book to be interesting. They tell many tales of the cruelty of slavery, not only the physical abuse but also the sexual and psychological abuse. In the years following the Civil War and the freeing of the slaves, times were very difficult if not impossible for the newly freed slaves. I never knew the extent of the struggle that these freed slaves went through in order to be free. It was a very good historic story, but the style of the writing and the overall telling of the story made it very difficult for me to get through. I also rented the movie and am watching it now and seeing it has actually made it much easier to understand. All things considered the book had many good properties but was just written in a language that was very tough for me to understand, which greatly tainted my opinion of the book.